Friday, 17 March 2017

In the new edition of my book Unveiling the Apocalypse: The Final Passover of the Church, I attempt to show how the apparitions which took place at Knock, in County Mayo in Ireland in 1879, were intended to announce the opening of the scroll sealed with seven seals described in the Apocalypse. During these apparitions, the Blessed Virgin appeared alongside the Lamb of Revelation, together with St. Joseph and St. John. The presence of the author of the Book of Revelation together with Christ in the form of the Lamb of God gives us a strong connotation that this apparition is apocalyptic in character, and that it was chiefly concerned with the opening of the scroll sealed with seven seals described in Rev 5:

Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming with a loud voice, “Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?” And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it, and I began to weep loudly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or to look into it. And one of the elders said to me, “Weep no more; behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.” (Rev 5:1-5)

Later in the Apocalypse, we are told that the scroll of the seven seals was given to St. John the Apostle so that he could consume the Word of God:

Then the voice that I had heard from heaven spoke to me again, saying, “Go, take the scroll that is open in the hand of the angel who is standing on the sea and on the land.” So I went to the angel and told him to give me the little scroll. And he said to me, “Take and eat it; it will make your stomach bitter, but in your mouth it will be sweet as honey.” And I took the little scroll from the hand of the angel and ate it. It was sweet as honey in my mouth, but when I had eaten it my stomach was made bitter. And I was told, “You must again prophesy about many peoples and nations and languages and kings.” (Rev 10:8-11)

One of the eyewitnesses to the Knock apparition, Mary Byrne, had described St. John as holding an open book in his hands during this vision:

The figure before me on this present occasion of which I am speaking had a book in the left hand, as I stated, and the index finger and the middle finger of the right hand raised, as if he were speaking, and impressing some point forcibly on an audience. It was this coincidence of figure and pose that made me surmise, for it is only an opinion, that the third figure was that of St. John, the beloved disciple of Our Lord…

Therefore the theme of the opening of the scroll sealed with seven seals is a predominant feature of the Knock apparition, and the entire symbolism of this vision must be understood within this context. In my book, I argue that the opening of the scroll of the seven seals described in the Apocalypse is synonymous with the unbinding of Satan at the end of the “thousand years” described in Rev 20, and that the appearance of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse during the opening of the sealed book was directly related to the “wars and rumours of wars” mentioned in the Olivet discourse, which Christ said must take place before His Second Coming. So the Knock apparition appears to be intimately connected to the vision of Pope Leo XIII, wherein the Holy Father was made to understand that Satan was to be granted a period of greater power. A period which not only encompassed the turmoil of the 20th century, but which was also marked by one of the most remarkable events in Church history – the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima and the occurrence of the Miracle of the Sun.

On the exact same day of the Knock apparition, on Aug 21st, 1879, Pope Leo XIII had granted a canonical coronation of the icon at the Basilica of Our Lady of La Salette, which was solemnly performed by the Cardinal Archbishop of Paris, Joseph-Hippolyte Guibert, who acted as Papal legate. This coronation took place 33 years after the apparition of Our Lady of La Salette in 1846. So while the icon of Our Lady of was being formally crowned at La Salette, Our Lady of Knock (who is recognized by the Irish as Queen of Ireland) appeared together with the Lamb of Revelation in order to announce the opening of the scroll sealed with seven seals.

But what exactly is the bridging connection between the apparitions of Our Lady of Our Lady at La Salette and those at Knock? The reason the Blessed Virgin decided to appear in County Mayo during this canonical coronation appears to directly linked with the public message Our Lady gave to Melanie Calvat and Maximin Giraurd at La Salette, which foretold the Potato Famine that would have devastating consequences for the population of Ireland:

Come near, my children, be not afraid; I am here to tell you great news.If my people will not submit, I shall be forced to let fall the arm of my Son. It is so strong, so heavy, that I can no longer withhold it. For how long a time do I suffer for you! If I would not have my Son abandon you, I am compelled to pray to him without ceasing; and as to you, you take not heed of it.However much you pray, however much you do, you will never recompense the pains I have taken for you. Six days I have given you to labor, the seventh I had kept for myself; and they will not give it to me. It is this which makes the arm of my Son so heavy. Those who drive the carts cannot swear without introducing the name of my Son. These are the two things which makes the arm of my Son so heavy.If the harvest is spoilt, it is all on your account. I gave you warning last year with the potatoes but you did not heed it. On the contrary, when you found the potatoes spoilt, you swore, you took the name of my Son in vain. They will continue to decay, so that by Christmas there will be none left. Ah, my children, do you not understand? Well, wait, I shall say it otherwise.If you have wheat, it is no good to sow it; all you sow the insects will eat, and what comes up will fall into dust when you thresh it. There will come a great famine. Before the famine comes, the children under seven years of age will be seized with trembling and will die in the hands of those who hold them; the others will do penance by the famine. The walnuts will become bad, and the grapes will rot.

[Here the two private messages were given to Mélanie and Maximin.]

If they are converted, the stones and rocks will change into mounds of wheat, and the potatoes will be self-sown in the land.

The Blessed Virgin has appeared to mark some of the most notorious instances of genocide in history, most notably those at Fatima, which coincided with the rise of Soviet Communism and the countless deaths that would ensue under militant atheism. Her appearances at Beauraing and Banneux in 1933 had coincided with the rise to power of Adolf Hitler, while those at Kibeho in 1981 augured the Rwandan Genocide. The apparitions of Our Lady at Zeitoun in Egypt in 1968 were similarly related to the modern day “slaughter of the innocents” in the holocaust of abortion. So Our Lady had appeared at Knock in order to mark the atrocity that was perpetrated against the Catholics of Ireland by the British Government, who exploited the events of the Famine as a means of kerbing the growth of the Irish population, in much the same way the Soviets had used the Holodomor to deplete the population of ethnic Ukrainians.

When we turn back to the opening of the scroll of the seven seals, we find that the theme of St. John being urged to eat the little scroll is rooted in the Book of Ezekiel:

“But you, son of man, hear what I say to you. Be not rebellious like that rebellious house; open your mouth and eat what I give you.” And when I looked, behold, a hand was stretched out to me, and behold, a scroll of a book was in it. And he spread it before me. And it had writing on the front and on the back, and there were written on it words of lamentation and mourning and woe. And he said to me, “Son of man, eat whatever you find here. Eat this scroll, and go, speak to the house of Israel.” So I opened my mouth, and he gave me this scroll to eat. And he said to me, “Son of man, feed your belly with this scroll that I give you and fill your stomach with it.” Then I ate it, and it was in my mouth as sweet as honey. And he said to me, “Son of man, go to the house of Israel and speak with my words to them." (Ezek 2:19-3:4)

The Prophet Ezekiel was similarly commanded to eat a scroll containing the Word of God when he was commissioned to prophesy to the people of Israel, warning them of their fate. Immediately after Ezekiel eats the little scroll, he was then taken to the exiles at the Chebar Canal:

Then the Spirit lifted me up, and I heard behind me the voice of a great earthquake: “Blessed be the glory of the Lord from its place!” It was the sound of the wings of the living creatures as they touched one another, and the sound of the wheels beside them, and the sound of a great earthquake. The Spirit lifted me up and took me away, and I went in bitterness in the heat of my spirit, the hand of the Lord being strong upon me. And I came to the exiles at Tel-abib, who were dwelling by the Chebar canal, and I sat where they were dwelling. And I sat there overwhelmed among them seven days. (Ezek 3:12-15)

The Chebar Canal is a location found along the River Euphrates, where Ezekiel was granted his vision of the Four Living Creatures in Ezek 1 – the four cherubim who restrain the appearance of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse until the opening of the seven seals. As I show in the book, the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are one and the same as the “four angels bound at the great river Euphrates” mentioned in Rev 9, who are released to kill a third of “the people” (i.e. a third of the world’s Jewish population during the Holocaust):

Then the sixth angel blew his trumpet, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar before God, saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, “Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.” So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour, the day, the month, and the year, were released to kill a third of [the people]. (Rev 9:13-15)

We are told that the four angels bound at the Euphrates are released after the appearance of the other signs which herald the unbinding of Satan at the end of the “thousand years” – the star falling to earth with the keys to the abyss and the rise of the apocalyptic locusts (which I argue refers to the Tunguska event and the invention of military airplanes). The Prophet Ezekiel was shown a vision of the Four Living creatures who restrain these fallen angelic beings at the Chebar Canal, which has been idenfied with the Khabur River in modern Syria - one of the largest tributaries to the River Euphrates. The exact spot where the Khabur River flows into the Euphrates lies at the site of Deir ez-Zor, which was the major concentration camp used by the Turkish government during the Armenian Genocide, which began in 1915. As I detail in Unveiling the Apocalypse: The Final Passover of the Church, it was the Armenian Genocide that the provided the Nazis with the template for perpetrating the Jewish Holocaust, when a third of the world's total Jewish population was exterminated by Nazi Germany.

Another link between the Jewish Holocaust and the appearance of Our Lady at Knock can be found in the fact that the apparitions took place at around the same time of the discovery and subsequent excavation of the Pergamon Altar in 1879 – which is the “throne of Satan” described in Rev 2:12-13. The Pergamon Altar was first erected in Berlin at the turn of the century, in 1900 – at the very beginning of the period of Satan’s greater power.

It thus seems to be of great significance that the upcoming total solar eclipse that will traverse America later this year takes place on the feast day of Our Lady of Knock, on 21st August, 2017. As I attempt to elaborate in the previous post, The Sign of Jonah and the Binding of Satan, another of the signs which heralded the beginning of the short time of Satan occurred on the feast day of Our Lady of Knock. The path of totality of the solar eclipse of 21st August, 1914 made its way across war-torn eastern Europe before crossing the site of ancient Nineveh. This was especially significant in the fact that there is evidence to suggest that the original “sign of Jonah” took the form of the Bur Sagle eclipse over Nineveh in 763BC, and that Christ had made His prophecy about the sign of Jonah in the immediate context of the binding of Satan.

The proximity of the August 21st solar eclipse in relation to the so-called “Rev 12 sign” that will take place later this year on 23rd September, 2017, gives us pause for thought. This date marks the culmination of an astronomical event which began on 20th November 20, 2016, when Jupiter (the King planet) entered into the body of the constellation Virgo. This date, which commemorated the feast of Christ the King, also saw the Polish Church and government officially proclaim Christ as King of Poland at the end of the Year of Mercy, styled after the canonical coronation of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa as Queen of Poland.

Due its retrograde motion, Jupiter will spend 9 ½ months within the “womb” of Virgo, until 23rd September, after which it will then be “birthed” by exiting with the Sun rising directly behind the constellation Virgo, with the Moon laying at its feet and a crown of twelve stars (the nine stars of the constellation Leo together with the planets Mercury, Venus and Mars).

If the American eclipse of 21st August, 2017 is indeed part of a “sign of Jonah” sequence related to this event, serving as a prophetic warning to the people of America, it is tempting to place it in relation to the words of the Prophet Jonah himself:

Then the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: “Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message I give you.” Jonah obeyed the word of the Lord and went to Nineveh. Now Nineveh was a very large city; it took three days to go through it. Jonah began by going a day’s journey into the city, proclaiming, “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” The Ninevites believed God. A fast was proclaimed, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth. (Jon 3:1-5)

It appears that the Ninevites only believed in Jonah’s prophecy of doom after the appearance of the Bur Sagle Eclipse. So, it will be interesting to see if anything happens around the time of the 21st August solar eclipse to act as a call to repentance for America. It is worth pointing out that exactly 40 days after the date of 21st August brings us up to the Feast of St. Michael the Archangel on 29th September, 2017, which coincides this year with the Jewish feast of Yom Kippur – the Day of Atonement. According to Jewish tradition, Yom Kippur is the date when the verdict of judgement against a person is sealed at the close of the year, after the opening of the Book of Life takes place at the beginning of the year, on Rosh Hashanah.

The feast of Yom Kippur also happens to be one of the central features of the Third Secret of Fatima, which describes two angels gathering up the blood of the martyrs and sprinkling it on the souls of those making their way to heaven. This imagery explicitly evokes the sprinkling of the sacrificial blood on the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant by the Jewish High Priest on the Feast of Yom Kippur, as is detailed in the Book of Leviticus:

And he shall take some of the blood of the bull and sprinkle it with his finger on the front of the mercy seat on the east side, and in front of the mercy seat he shall sprinkle some of the blood with his finger seven times. Then he shall kill the goat of the sin offering that is for the people and bring its blood inside the veil and do with its blood as he did with the blood of the bull, sprinkling it over the mercy seat and in front of the mercy seat. Thus he shall make atonement for the Holy Place, because of the uncleannesses of the people of Israel and because of their transgressions, all their sins.

(Lev 16:14-16)

After the two parts which I have already explained, at the left of Our Lady and a little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand; flashing, it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire; but they died out in contact with the splendour that Our Lady radiated towards him from her right hand: pointing to the earth with his right hand, the Angel cried out in a loud voice: 'Penance, Penance, Penance!'. And we saw in an immense light that is God: 'something similar to how people appear in a mirror when they pass in front of it' a Bishop dressed in White 'we had the impression that it was the Holy Father'. Other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious going up a steep mountain, at the top of which there was a big Cross of rough-hewn trunks as of a cork-tree with the bark; before reaching there the Holy Father passed through a big city half in ruins and half trembling with halting step, afflicted with pain and sorrow, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he met on his way; having reached the top of the mountain, on his knees at the foot of the big Cross he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and arrows at him, and in the same way there died one after another the other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious, and various lay people of different ranks and positions. Beneath the two arms of the Cross there were two Angels each with a crystal aspersorium in his hand, in which they gathered up the blood of the Martyrs and with it sprinkled the souls that were making their way to God. Tuy-3-1-1944.(The Third Secret of Fatima)

So not only does the feast of Yom Kippur occur exactly 40 days after the “sign of Jonah” eclipse on 21st August, 2017, but it also occurs on the Feast of St. Michael – the angel with the flaming sword seen in the Third Secret of Fatima. Could something of prophetic importance transpire around these dates just before the centenary of the Miracle of the Sun on 13th October, 2017? It is tempting to think so, given the apparent sensus fidelium that appears to have been arrived at concerning the significance of the centenary of the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima. Especially when we take the various other accompanying “signs” that appear to be settling around these dates.

Monday, 6 March 2017

I would like to draw your attention to Stephen Walford's excellent new book Communion of Saints: The Unity of Divine Love in the Mystical Body of Christ. This book is about eschatology in the truest sense of the word, in that it primarily focuses on the de novissimis - the four last things of death, judgment, Heaven and Hell. Walford is a gifted and erudite author, and his latest work on the mystical nature of the Church is quite beautifully written. The fact that Walford's Communion of Saints draws not only on the writings of the popes, but also various saints and doctors of the Church, makes this book an invaluable resource for anyone interested in the subjects of ecclesiology and eschatology.

Of particular interest to both myself and the readers of this blog, the epilogue to Walford's new book contains an excellent survey of the errors perpetuated by the spiritual millenarian movement within Catholicism, which is spearheaded by various influential individuals such as Fr. Joseph Iannuzzi and the popular Catholic evangelist Mark Mallett. Walford presents a detailed critique of Iannuzzi's spiritual millennialism, which erroneously equates the period of peace promised by Our Lady of Fatima with the binding of Satan detailed in chapter 20 of the Apocalypse. By encouraging their followers to do, the spiritual millennialists not only advocate a complete rejection of the eschatology of St. Augustine of Hippo, but also steer their readers into the trap of millenarian heresy, contrary to the teachings of the Catechism:

The Antichrist's deception already begins to take shape in the world every time the claim is made to realize within history that messianic hope which can only be realized beyond history through the eschatological judgement. The Church has rejected even modified forms of this falsification of the kingdom to come under the name of millenarianism, especially the "intrinsically perverse" political form of a secular messianism (CCC 676).

Over the course of the next few months on this blog, I will attempt to address several of the serious errors perpetrated by the spiritual millenarian movement, and how their theology undermines the Catholic Faith to its very core. Stephen Walford's book is a great gift to the Church in this time of confusion, and the fact that he boldly throws down the gauntlet to this modern heresy deserves high praise indeed.

Also worth noting is that all proceeds of Communion of Saints goes to Aid to the Church in Need for the persecuted Christians of the Middle East.

About Me

As part of research for my book Unveiling the Apocalypse: Prophecy in Catholic Tradition, I studied the Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic languages before graduating in 2006 with First Class honours. My book is the product of around ten years of original research. This blog is intended as a means of supplementing the material presented in the book by providing relevant up-to-date information.